GRE Preparation Strategy

Several health professions opt to use the Graduate Record Exam (GRE) as their admissions test, including veterinary medicine and physical therapy. The GRE general test does not test specific knowledge, unlike the MCAT or DAT; instead, as an aptitute test it measures verbal reasoning, quantitative reasoning and analytical writing ability in order to predict academic ability in an array of graduate and professional programs. Preparation for the GRE, therefore, is quite different from achievement tests like the MCAT.

Find your baseline: Start by finding out how you would score if you took the GRE today: take a timed full-length practice test using PowerPrep II, available free from ETS. When you have finished the test, PowerPrep provides an estimate of how your scores compare to others in your field of interest. Once you have that information, you'll know where to focus your efforts: for example, if you are shooting for a 159 on the Quantitative section and you scored a 149 on the practice test, you will know that you should allow time to improve that score. How long it will take you to do so depends on several factors, among them:

how much you would like to improve,

how much time you have to study,

how quickly you can learn new skills, and

how well you tend to perform on standardized tests.

Improve your score: Download the GRE Prep Flow Chart for step-by-step recommendations for each of the three sections of the GRE Revised general test.

Additional helpful resources from the Hanover College Career Center:

GRE General Test Facts At a Glance A PDF breaking down basic information about the Revised General test, including number of questions per section, question types, answer formats, and score ranges.

GRE PowerPoint Presentation (2.25 MB) An introduction to the Revised GRE General test with an explanation of the computer adaptive nature of the test, examples of the types of questions each section contains, registration information, and much more.